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https://shellshare.net https://shellshare.net I have migrated my wife's (then girlfriend) computer to Linux and sometimes I had to configure something on her c

https://shellshare.net https://shellshare.net I have migrated my wife's (then girlfriend) computer to Linux and sometimes I had to configure something on her computer (e.g. a printer). This ended up generating lots of back and forth on the phone with me telling her commands to write in the terminal, and she reading the output out loud. I wanted an easy way to see her terminal. So shellshare was born. Shellshare allows you to run a single command line and share your terminal online (read-only) wget -qO shellshare http://get.shellshare.net && python shellshare That'll give you an URL others can join and watch your terminal live. No sessions, no recordings, and the data is deleted every day. There aren't many users, but I use it almost every week.

feiss 10y ago
this is brilliant, and very useful. Well done!
royalharsh95 10y ago
this is cooool. :)
thecatalinstan 10y ago
Thank you for this one :)
arms 10y ago
This is great. Thanks for creating and sharing. I've made sure to bookmark it.
btilly 10y ago
I like https://tmate.io/ https://tmate.io/ for this. It also has a read-write option. :-)
- vitorbaptistaa 10y ago
  This is another great option, with much more features than shellshare. At the time I started working on shellshare, it only allowed read/write sessions, so I wrote it anyway.
Declanomous 10y ago
Wow, that's pretty cool. I've thought about moving my parents to Linux; my mom only uses the internet, and while my dad needs his computer for work, the software he uses supports Linux. I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to support Windows for them for much longer. I use Linux full time, and Windows is slowly changing. I can still talk them through most problems over the phone, but little changes here and there have made walking them through an issue really time consuming, which is frustrating for all of us. My chief concern with installing Linux was having to teach them how to communicate what is happening over the phone all over again. Outside of that, I'm pretty confident Linux is a good choice for my parents. My dad actually worked for Digital Electronics for years, and he's been interested in Linux for as long as I've been using it, but I think Linux would actually be better for my mom, because she literally doesn't care about her computer as long as it works. Her computer issues are generally the "the computer keeps telling me something and I want it to go away" type. Fixing those problems on the phone with Windows is a mess, but are basically trivial in Linux. My dad's issues are generally "I broke the internet," so this wouldn't be as helpful for him. I'm really excited about this. I might honestly go buy an SSD to install Linux on my Mom's computer today. That way I could just drop it in her computer next time I'm at her house. My hope is that the boost in speed from Windows---> Linux, and the boost in speed from a 5400 rpm drive --> SSD would keep her happy long enough to get used to Linux. She's been complaining a lot about speed recently, and last time I was there I discovered she managed to her default user folder from the internal drive to an external USB backup drive. I have no idea how she did this, but it means she keeps running out of space because the backup process now backs up the backup drive recursively.
- joshrowley 10y ago
  Have you ever considered installing remote screensharing software rather then having to troubleshoot over the phone? That's how I help out my parents.
  - Declanomous 10y ago
    Yeah, I've used it at times. It's great when it works, but getting remote desktop working is always a bigger pain than just trying to explain the problem over the phone. The individual issues aren't that big, but it means a 20 minute phone call turns in to a 1 hour phone call because we spend 20 minutes trying to get screen sharing working. For one thing, I'm generally away from my computer when they call me, and all I have is my phone. If that isn't an issue, then port forwarding is an issue, or the desktop sharing they have on their computer is out of date, or they only have RDC, and I can't find a Windows computer. Sharing the desktop via chrome works pretty well, it still can be an exercise in frustration. For instance, my dad is a trader, and has 8 monitors. Getting him to share the correct screens takes forever. (I don't know how Windows decides where to open a window, but it seems like it tries to find a monitor my dad isn't looking at and opening it behind a window marked stay-on-top.) I might use it if the problem was extremely urgent and extremely complicated, but I live about 30 minutes from them, so I'd just head over to their house if it was that bad. Screen sharing software was just one more thing to go wrong on their computers. This way, I don't have to worry about whether they have a version with a critical vulnerability, or if they'll fall for a social engineering attack and click on a teamviewer invite. This software solves my concern about not being able to see what the hell my parents are doing when I'm telling them shell commands. This makes it really easy. They'd already be using Linux if I knew I'd always be able to use desktop sharing to look at their computer, and port forwarding/security/etc wasn't a concern, because connecting to a remote X server is incredibly easy. I already fix internet issues by SSHing in to the router (with key-based authentication) and then connecting to whatever piece of hardware needs to be tinkered with. I could probably do the same thing for an actual desktop, but I've fixed misbehaving servers via ssh on my phone before, and typing commands on a phone keyboard is an exercise in frustration. In any case, I sat down with my dad and created a clean image of his desktop a while back. When he really messes something up he just reimages his computer. He likes the fact that I gave him the ability to bring his computer back from the dead himself. All his files are installed on a separate disk, which is constantly backed up, so he never loses more than about 20 minutes of work.
Ace17 10y ago
Can the same effect be achieved via GNU screen (potentially combined with an SSH tunnel)?
- viraptor 10y ago
  http://hamvocke.com/blog/remote-pair-programming-with-tmux/ http://hamvocke.com/blog/remote-pair-programming-with-tmux/ it describes tmux setup, but screen can do it as well - there are guides online.
JoshTriplett 10y ago
I like that it only allows watching, not interacting; that makes the security implications of someone obtaining the URL much less serious.
cperciva 10y ago
wget -qO shellshare http://get.shellshare.net http://get.shellshare.net && python shellshare Please don't tell people to do this. This is an idiom called "curl pipe sh"; you're asking people to run whatever code someone on their network decides to send them. As an absolute minimum, you should change that http to https, so that they're merely running whatever code YOU decide to send them; but even that doesn't quite fit with the "share your terminal (read-only)" philosophy...
- BHSPitMonkey 10y ago
  I agree with the HTTPS part, but aside from that I can't really see how it's less safe than saying "here, install this .deb (which gets to run scripts as root) and then run the binary inside".
  - viraptor 10y ago
    deb packages distributed to the public should be pgp signed and in a proper repository. It doesn't help people who will just force-install it anyway, but if they care it allows verification.
    - flukus 10y ago
      Both require trusting others, how is this any different?
      - viraptor 10y ago
        Out of band verification. When you're doing curl pipe sh, you're trusting the host and that's it. With packages, you can verify the trust against external services like keybase, check website archive for changed key ids, check signatures on the public key if the author is into things like web of trust. It won't protect you against someone being directly malicious, but it will against MitM, website hacks, etc. It also establishes semi-permanent trust on first use.
        10y ago
bertiewhykovich 10y ago
why would you do that to your poor wife
viraptor 10y ago
Why not just SSH + shared screen / tmux? Not sure why you need to involve the browser.
- flukus 10y ago
  Incoming SSH connections can/should be blocked by the router. There is also likely to be no static IP.
  - viraptor 10y ago
    Connect them to a private zerotier network (https://www.zerotier.com/#try_zerotier https://www.zerotier.com/#try_zerotier) it's free and you can bind sshd just to the zt0 interface. Instant access from anywhere.
    - rspeer 10y ago
      That sounds a lot harder than solving the original problem.
      - viraptor 10y ago
        I may be biased, but I put zerotier on lots of hosts these days. Whether it's home raspberrypi for remote access, or vps to get all administration off the public network, or sometimes just as a VPN replacement for stuff like replication. It's pretty much fire and forget.
    - flukus 10y ago
      Sounds like yet another hosted/subscription based service.
      - viraptor 10y ago
        You can use your own server if you prefer. Otherwise it's hosted. No subscription needed if you're not using massive networks.
  - 10y ago
bottled_poe 10y ago
What a great way to create huge amounts of IT maintenance work for yourself.
- flukus 10y ago
  How so?
  - bottled_poe 10y ago
    Linux tends to require configuration/debugging from the console. Don't get me wrong, I use linux every day, but I would never push it on someone who is not interested in solving their own tech problems.
    - flukus 10y ago
      If it's setup and working it requires no configuration/debugging. And it sounds like whether it's windows or linux he's going to be responsible for fixing any computer problems so it may as well be on a platform less prone to problems that he can fix better. Just being on a platform where uses can't get infected with malware from stupid flash game sites cuts out 90% of maintenance.

feiss 10y ago

this is brilliant, and very useful. Well done!

royalharsh95 10y ago

this is cooool. :)

thecatalinstan 10y ago

Thank you for this one :)

arms 10y ago

This is great. Thanks for creating and sharing. I've made sure to bookmark it.

btilly 10y ago

I like https://tmate.io/ https://tmate.io/ for this. It also has a read-write option. :-)

vitorbaptistaa 10y ago
This is another great option, with much more features than shellshare. At the time I started working on shellshare, it only allowed read/write sessions, so I wrote it anyway.

Declanomous 10y ago

Wow, that's pretty cool. I've thought about moving my parents to Linux; my mom only uses the internet, and while my dad needs his computer for work, the software he uses supports Linux. I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to support Windows for them for much longer. I use Linux full time, and Windows is slowly changing. I can still talk them through most problems over the phone, but little changes here and there have made walking them through an issue really time consuming, which is frustrating for all of us. My chief concern with installing Linux was having to teach them how to communicate what is happening over the phone all over again. Outside of that, I'm pretty confident Linux is a good choice for my parents. My dad actually worked for Digital Electronics for years, and he's been interested in Linux for as long as I've been using it, but I think Linux would actually be better for my mom, because she literally doesn't care about her computer as long as it works. Her computer issues are generally the "the computer keeps telling me something and I want it to go away" type. Fixing those problems on the phone with Windows is a mess, but are basically trivial in Linux. My dad's issues are generally "I broke the internet," so this wouldn't be as helpful for him. I'm really excited about this. I might honestly go buy an SSD to install Linux on my Mom's computer today. That way I could just drop it in her computer next time I'm at her house. My hope is that the boost in speed from Windows---> Linux, and the boost in speed from a 5400 rpm drive --> SSD would keep her happy long enough to get used to Linux. She's been complaining a lot about speed recently, and last time I was there I discovered she managed to her default user folder from the internal drive to an external USB backup drive. I have no idea how she did this, but it means she keeps running out of space because the backup process now backs up the backup drive recursively.

joshrowley 10y ago
Have you ever considered installing remote screensharing software rather then having to troubleshoot over the phone? That's how I help out my parents.
- Declanomous 10y ago
  Yeah, I've used it at times. It's great when it works, but getting remote desktop working is always a bigger pain than just trying to explain the problem over the phone. The individual issues aren't that big, but it means a 20 minute phone call turns in to a 1 hour phone call because we spend 20 minutes trying to get screen sharing working. For one thing, I'm generally away from my computer when they call me, and all I have is my phone. If that isn't an issue, then port forwarding is an issue, or the desktop sharing they have on their computer is out of date, or they only have RDC, and I can't find a Windows computer. Sharing the desktop via chrome works pretty well, it still can be an exercise in frustration. For instance, my dad is a trader, and has 8 monitors. Getting him to share the correct screens takes forever. (I don't know how Windows decides where to open a window, but it seems like it tries to find a monitor my dad isn't looking at and opening it behind a window marked stay-on-top.) I might use it if the problem was extremely urgent and extremely complicated, but I live about 30 minutes from them, so I'd just head over to their house if it was that bad. Screen sharing software was just one more thing to go wrong on their computers. This way, I don't have to worry about whether they have a version with a critical vulnerability, or if they'll fall for a social engineering attack and click on a teamviewer invite. This software solves my concern about not being able to see what the hell my parents are doing when I'm telling them shell commands. This makes it really easy. They'd already be using Linux if I knew I'd always be able to use desktop sharing to look at their computer, and port forwarding/security/etc wasn't a concern, because connecting to a remote X server is incredibly easy. I already fix internet issues by SSHing in to the router (with key-based authentication) and then connecting to whatever piece of hardware needs to be tinkered with. I could probably do the same thing for an actual desktop, but I've fixed misbehaving servers via ssh on my phone before, and typing commands on a phone keyboard is an exercise in frustration. In any case, I sat down with my dad and created a clean image of his desktop a while back. When he really messes something up he just reimages his computer. He likes the fact that I gave him the ability to bring his computer back from the dead himself. All his files are installed on a separate disk, which is constantly backed up, so he never loses more than about 20 minutes of work.

Ace17 10y ago

Can the same effect be achieved via GNU screen (potentially combined with an SSH tunnel)?

viraptor 10y ago
http://hamvocke.com/blog/remote-pair-programming-with-tmux/ http://hamvocke.com/blog/remote-pair-programming-with-tmux/ it describes tmux setup, but screen can do it as well - there are guides online.

JoshTriplett 10y ago

I like that it only allows watching, not interacting; that makes the security implications of someone obtaining the URL much less serious.

cperciva 10y ago

wget -qO shellshare http://get.shellshare.net http://get.shellshare.net && python shellshare Please don't tell people to do this. This is an idiom called "curl pipe sh"; you're asking people to run whatever code someone on their network decides to send them. As an absolute minimum, you should change that http to https, so that they're merely running whatever code YOU decide to send them; but even that doesn't quite fit with the "share your terminal (read-only)" philosophy...

BHSPitMonkey 10y ago
I agree with the HTTPS part, but aside from that I can't really see how it's less safe than saying "here, install this .deb (which gets to run scripts as root) and then run the binary inside".
- viraptor 10y ago
  deb packages distributed to the public should be pgp signed and in a proper repository. It doesn't help people who will just force-install it anyway, but if they care it allows verification.
  - flukus 10y ago
    Both require trusting others, how is this any different?
    - viraptor 10y ago
      Out of band verification. When you're doing curl pipe sh, you're trusting the host and that's it. With packages, you can verify the trust against external services like keybase, check website archive for changed key ids, check signatures on the public key if the author is into things like web of trust. It won't protect you against someone being directly malicious, but it will against MitM, website hacks, etc. It also establishes semi-permanent trust on first use.
      - 10y ago

bertiewhykovich 10y ago

why would you do that to your poor wife

viraptor 10y ago

Why not just SSH + shared screen / tmux? Not sure why you need to involve the browser.

flukus 10y ago
Incoming SSH connections can/should be blocked by the router. There is also likely to be no static IP.
- viraptor 10y ago
  Connect them to a private zerotier network (https://www.zerotier.com/#try_zerotier https://www.zerotier.com/#try_zerotier) it's free and you can bind sshd just to the zt0 interface. Instant access from anywhere.
  - rspeer 10y ago
    That sounds a lot harder than solving the original problem.
    - viraptor 10y ago
      I may be biased, but I put zerotier on lots of hosts these days. Whether it's home raspberrypi for remote access, or vps to get all administration off the public network, or sometimes just as a VPN replacement for stuff like replication. It's pretty much fire and forget.
  - flukus 10y ago
    Sounds like yet another hosted/subscription based service.
    - viraptor 10y ago
      You can use your own server if you prefer. Otherwise it's hosted. No subscription needed if you're not using massive networks.
- 10y ago

bottled_poe 10y ago

What a great way to create huge amounts of IT maintenance work for yourself.

flukus 10y ago
How so?
- bottled_poe 10y ago
  Linux tends to require configuration/debugging from the console. Don't get me wrong, I use linux every day, but I would never push it on someone who is not interested in solving their own tech problems.
  - flukus 10y ago
    If it's setup and working it requires no configuration/debugging. And it sounds like whether it's windows or linux he's going to be responsible for fixing any computer problems so it may as well be on a platform less prone to problems that he can fix better. Just being on a platform where uses can't get infected with malware from stupid flash game sites cuts out 90% of maintenance.